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For the four conventional face-centered cubic lattice sites $000$, $0\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}$, $\frac{1}{2}0\frac{1}{2}$ and $\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}0$, their centering factor isThis is the face-centred cubic selection rule. Enumerating the nonzero representatives with $h^2+k^2+l^2\le 16$ givesSymmetry-related permutations and signs belong to the same powder ring, not additional rings. For Al, the basis contains one atom, $S=F_{\mathrm{fcc}}{f}_{\mathrm{Al}}$. ThusFor the stated KCl basis,The all-even reflections add the two atomic factors; all-odd reflections subtract them. Ionic $K^{+}$ and $C{l}^{-}$ each have 18 electrons, giving similar X-ray amplitudes. Their difference is much smaller than their sum, so the 111 and 311 rings are weak. Consequently the four strong rings areThis is an accidental diffraction extinction from equal atomic scattering factors in the equal-factor limit, not an extra exact fcc selection rule. Isoelectronic ions can have different radial electron distributions, so real odd reflections need not vanish exactly. Even the cruder neutral-atom estimate $f_K\simeq 19$, $f_{\mathrm{Cl}}\simeq 17$ makes the odd/even basis-intensity ratio only $(2/36{)}^2\simeq 0.0031$, before other ring-intensity factors.

For Si's displaced identical basis atoms,For all-odd indices, the bracket is $1\pm i$, with squared magnitude 2. For all-even indices it vanishes when $h+k+l=2(\mathrm{mod}4)$, and has squared magnitude 4 when the sum is a multiple of four. Thus 200 and 222 vanish, whereas 111, 220, 311 and 400 survive:These are the basis extinctions of the ideal diamond cubic structure. Intensity strengths within each surviving set can still differ because of atomic factors, multiplicity and geometry.

The X-ray wavelength is $\lambda =hc/E=1.54980\times 10^{-10}\mathrm{m}$. Write the amplitude of one conventional unit cell as the face-centred cubic selection rule times the two-atom atomic basis amplitude:The first bracket is four when the indices have equal parity and zero otherwise. Among the allowed Bragg reflections, the zinc blende structure factor therefore givesHere the atomic scattering factors are taken as real. For the requested rough estimate set $f_{\mathrm{Ga}}\simeq 31$ and $f_{\mathrm{As}}\simeq 33$. The weak difference reflections remain allowed: unequal species do not have the extra exact extinction of the equal-species diamond limit.

The first six allowed values of $h^2+k^2+l^2$ are $3,4,8,11,12,16$. Bragg's law gives the measured scattering angle $2\theta =2{\sin }^{-1}(\lambda \sqrt{h^2+k^2+l^2}/2a)$. For powder diffraction, multiply the squared amplitude by the powder diffraction multiplicity $m_{hkl}$. The last two columns use $I_{111}=100$:The first intensity column is the geometry-independent multiplicity-and-structure estimate. The second additionally assumes an unpolarized beam and a common symmetric powder-diffractometer geometry, with Lorentz-polarization factorAn overall constant cancels in either normalization. A particular measured intensity set is not fixed by the atomic numbers alone: actual atomic scattering factors decrease with momentum transfer, anomalous scattering and absorption can matter, and the instrument geometry and polarization determine angular corrections. The two columns state the approximation rather than asserting identical peak heights for all instruments.^[ref]

In cubic coordinates write $\mathbf{G}=(2\pi /a)(h,k,l)$. The face-centred cubic selection rule allows integer triples only when $h,k,l$ are all even or all odd. One way to derive it is to sum the four conventional-cell lattice positions:This vanishes for mixed parity and equals four otherwise. The two-atom diamond atomic basis adds the factorFor all-odd indices this is nonzero. For all-even indices it vanishes when $h+k+l=2(\mathrm{mod}4)$ and survives when the sum is divisible by four: this is diamond-basis diffraction extinction.

Exclude the forward beam $000$ and order the remaining families by $h^2+k^2+l^2$. The first is $111$, with squared length three. The candidate $200$, with squared length four, is extinguished by the diamond atomic basis. The next allowed family is $220$, with squared length eight. ThusFor fixed incident wavelength, $|\mathbf{G}|=2k\sin \theta$ increases with scattering angle, so these are the two lowest-angle powder rings. The two atoms are counted per primitive cell; a conventional silicon cube contains four lattice points and eight atoms.

Replace every coloured site in the drawing by an identical site carrying $\bar{f}$. The face-centering lattice translations now preserve the average crystal structure, whose Bravais lattice is a face-centered cubic lattice. One choice of primitive lattice translation vectors isA coherent Bragg diffraction peak requires $\mathbf{G}\cdot {\mathbf{a}}_j\in 2\pi \mathbb{Z}$ for all three primitive lattice translation vectors. Thus $k+l$, $h+l$, and $h+k$ must all be even, equivalent to all three Miller indices having the same integer parity. This is the face-centred cubic selection rule: $(110)$ is forbidden and $(111)$ is allowed. The restoration of these lattice translations explains the disappearance of the ordered superlattice reflections.

For cubic lattice planes, $d_{hkl}=a/\sqrt{h^2+k^2+l^2}$. The face-centred cubic selection rule permits indices that are all odd or all even. ThusThe first two spacings exceed the quoted 0.19 nm real-space resolution, whereas $d_{220}$ does not. This restriction is for the resolved image and its transform; a diffraction instrument need not have the same cutoff.

A natural candidate is a beam near a local $⟨110⟩$ zone axis. For example, the $[110]$ zone law $h+k=0$ includes four $\{111\}$ reflections and two $\{200\}$ reflections, all within that real-space cutoff. Their reciprocal-space length ratio is $g_{200}/g_{111}=2/\sqrt{3}=1.1547$. The angle between $(1\bar{1}1)$ and $(1\bar{1}\bar{1})$ reciprocal vectors is ${\cos }^{-1}(1/3)=70.53^{\circ }$. In contrast, a $[001]$ view gives a fourfold arrangement of the resolvable $\{200\}$ family, while the lowest ordinary $[111]$ zone reflections are $\{220\}$ and would not be resolved at the stated cutoff.

In a five-domain decahedral interpretation, neighboring tetrahedral fcc regions meet on $\{111\}$ twin planes around a common near-$⟨110⟩$ axis. Five unstrained wedges supply $5\times 70.53^{\circ }=352.64^{\circ }$; elastic distortion accommodates the remaining $7.36^{\circ }$. Their rotated diffraction contributions need not resemble a single six-spot $[110]$ pattern. Near-$⟨110⟩$ fcc domains in a multiply twinned particle are a defensible orientation proposal, not a unique full indexing. The printed transform has no reciprocal-space scale or indexed spot list, so it cannot establish every domain rotation or exclude an overlapping-particle contribution. Calibrated spacings and transforms from individual regions would settle those distinctions. The five-domain geometry is independently observed in atomic-resolution gold-particle measurements.^[ref]